


Little Bear

by Dedicate Kiwicrocus (cranky__crocus)



Series: SMACKDOWN '11 R2, R3, Final - CIRCLECEST [27]
Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Goldenlake, Multi, smackdown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-10
Updated: 2011-06-10
Packaged: 2017-10-20 07:40:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/210336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cranky__crocus/pseuds/Dedicate%20Kiwicrocus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It seemed so final, to have put a lid on it...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for SMACKDOWN at Goldenlake: fiefgoldenlake.proboards.com

            Sandry felt the fine powder between her fingers. It was light—could blow away if she breathed too deeply—and yet it felt heavy to her. The weight of it on her fingers was substantial on her heart.

            “Stop playing with Little Bear,” Briar chided, although he did not have it in him to put humour in his voice. The jest fell short; Sandry wiped a tear from her eye.

            “It had to happen someday,” Tris sighed out. She held a book to her chest. “It’s not even too soon. But…”

            Daja gripped her hand when it dropped from the book. “It feels too soon anyway, because it came at all.”

            Lark took the lid from Sandry’s fingers—gently, coaxing—and placed it back over the smooth container. Her fingers shook anyway. Rosethorn helped her place the lid; she worked to hide the reflective shine of her eyes but they all noticed anyway.

            It seemed so final, to have put a lid on it—on Little Bear.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "...Me and Little Bear, the mutts you somehow loved anyway."

 “Glaki will be devastated,” Rosethorn said as she gazed at the urn on the table. Her voice was a croak; she cleared her throat. “She was too attached to that dog.”

            “Only as attached as you,” Briar responded. Only he or Lark could really call her out on it. She didn’t seem to have the energy to bark or bite, and only smiled sheepishly at him; the smile was weighted down at the corners. “We all were. Me and Little Bear, the mutts you somehow loved anyway.”

            Rosethorn ruffled his hair and leaned on him, even as she held Lark’s hand.

            “We loved him more than you,” Tris conceded. She stroked the urn before her. Briar laughed.

            “He was brave,” Sandry declared. “He made it through everything we did—even an earthquake and travels.”

            “And Glaki,” Daja added, teeth peeking through her lips. “Takes a good old dog to put up with new children.”

            “I’ll say,” Rosethorn agreed, though when she glanced at Lark it was clear she was feeling rather canine that day as well.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I hope it suits Little Bear,” Sandry said softly.

Daja trailed a finger down the urn on Discipline’s kitchen table. She touched it fondly. “What are we going to do with the ashes?”

            “We hadn’t decided,” Lark answered, looking to Rosethorn and her four grown foster-children. “We thought you ought to decide.”

            “I think some of him should go in the garden,” Briar stated, smiling at the memories of Little Bear loping around the place. “He loved the garden.”

            “Out to sea, too,” Daja mentioned. “So the Trader Gods can keep an eye on him.”

            “By the caves, where he helped us four join together,” Sandry suggested.

            “I think some of him should stay above the hearth,” Tris added. “This was his home, and food was his favourite.”

            “Can’t blame him there.” Briar grinned. He turned to Rosethorn and Lark. “What about you?”

            “He was _your_ dog,” Rosethorn replied, but her eyes were red-rimmed. “If you all are putting some of him in the garden, that’s enough for me—dusting over my plants…” Her voice softened as it drifted.

            Lark nodded. “By the hearth suits me as well.”

            “I hope it suits Little Bear,” Sandry said softly.

            Tris placed a hand on her arm. “I’m sure it does.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daja whistled through her fingers. “Sleep well, Little Bear.”

Lark and Rosethorn drew the gods’ circle over their chests as Briar sprinkled Little Bear’s ashes in Rosethorn’s garden. Tris grasped it with a breeze from her braids and brought the ashes up in the sunlight, where they hung like sparkles in the air for a second before she spread them around the garden.

            “Have a good romp, Little Bear,” Briar called out. He imagined Little Bear sniffing about—and Rosethorn chasing him off. Back when they were both young, at least, or younger.

            “Don’t eat Rosethorn’s tomatoes,” Tris instructed. Rosethorn grinned weakly at her.

            “Say hello to Shriek when he visits,” Sandry suggested. Her smile was faint.

            Daja whistled through her fingers. “Sleep well, Little Bear.”

            “Sleep peacefully,” Lark murmured. Rosethorn nodded her head. The six took last looks of the garden with Little Bear in mind and turned back to Discipline.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Family doesn’t make distinctions between numbers of legs or length of life. Little Bear was family.”

Daja held Little Bear’s urn tight in her arms as the boat cut through the waves and wind. When she and her family—foster-siblings and foster-mothers—were out into the bay, she turned to the side of the boat and looked deep into the blue-green waters. Sandry grasped her knee; Tris and Daja held Sandry’s other hand.

            After a deep breath, Daja drew a handful of ashes from the container and held it out over the water. Some ashes trickled away, trailing down in soft lines that spread before reaching the sea. She let his ashes sift out slowly and adjusted her hand any time the stream slowed.

            “May the sea protect you, Little Bear,” she murmured out to the waters. She dipped her hand in the salt water, blew and made the Trader Gods sign with her hands.

            Sandry squeezed her knee. Tris and Briar touched her with their magic; Daja gripped it with her own, entwining them all for the moment.

            She whispered, “Goodbye, Little Bear” and eased into Sandry’s embrace.

            “It isn’t silly,” she told her friends and family. “Family doesn’t make distinctions between numbers of legs or length of life. Little Bear was family.”

            “He was,” some of them responded; the others thought it.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Goodbye, Little Bear,” she called.

The old caves by the sea were different from how they had once been. Briar, Daja, Sandry and Tris recalled this from later explorations during their Winding Circle years: after the earthquake, the caves had shifted.

            Sandry found the closest approximation, location-wise, to the cave she and her friends had entered so many summers ago, right before the earthquake. She caught sight of the sea from where she stood and recalled Daja dispersing Little Bear’s ashes in the waves.

            The urn was heavy in Sandry’s hands. She lifted the lid—Tris held it for her—and took a handful. “Could you all get in a circle, please?”

            Her family formed a tight circle: Lark, Rosethorn, Briar, Daja, Tris and a spot for Sandry between Tris and Lark. Sandry started sprinkling the ashes behind Lark and worked herself around the circle, keeping herself inside as she closed it. She blew on her hand when she finished; Tris reattached the lid.

            Sandry placed the urn in the centre of the circle and grasped hands with Lark and Tris.

            “Thank you for bringing us all together, Little Bear. You forged a circle between us and made our collection of personalities a family.”

            Sandry squeezed Tris’ hand for a few seconds. After a moment, she felt Lark squeeze her hand in a similar way; the touch had made its way around the circle. She squeezed both Lark and Tris’ hands and let go, ducking to collect the urn once more.

            Daja wiped the tears from Sandry’s eyes; Briar took the urn when it was loose in her hands. Tris kept the wind from disturbing the circle of ashes around them until Sandry broke it with her finger and they all stepped out.

            “Goodbye, Little Bear,” she called.

            “Goodbye, Little Bear,” the others repeated.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We wouldn’t really let you leave.”

Discipline felt strange without a dog under foot. Then, it had been a few years since Little Bear had been properly under foot, but he had at least sniffed around consistently. The absence of claws against wood floors was strange, even as the four Circle mages had not lived in Discipline for many years.

            Tris placed the urn of his ashes up on a shelf atop the hearth.

            Daja lifted her hand and carved into the shelf with her fingernail and magical heat: Little Bear’s Home.

            Briar dusted herbs around the urn; Rosethorn assisted him.

            Sandry fixed her embroidered cloth over the shelf, next to Daja’s engraving. Lark and Sandry held the corners as Briar waved a hand over it; the wood incorporated some of the cloth fibres, enough to keep it stuck firmly.

            “He’ll always be home this way,” Tris asserted as she stepped back and stared up at his new spot. “And never hungry.”

            “I have to envy him a little.” Briar dropped an arm over Tris’ shoulder.

            Sandry wrapped her arm around Tris’ waist but looked to Briar. “You haven’t been hungry for quite some time and you _always_ have a home.”

            “We’re lucky that way,” Daja affirmed. She stood beside the three and grasped Lark’s hand; the woman smiled to have been included. Rosethorn stood at Lark’s other side, linked by their little fingers.

            “Welcome home, Little Bear.” Tris smiled up at the urn. “We wouldn’t really let you leave.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! C: Hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
